


Snapdragon

by Prim_the_Amazing



Series: Bingo [4]
Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Multi, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-09-29 22:25:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17211968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prim_the_Amazing/pseuds/Prim_the_Amazing
Summary: To her eternal embarrassment, Arum notices something is off with her health before she herself does. He’s going to be so unbearably smug about it for the rest of eternity-- once he stops being worried, that is.





	Snapdragon

**Author's Note:**

> This is the Wild Card square of the bingo card, so I chose the Kids/Babies prompt.

To her eternal embarrassment, Arum notices something is off with her health before she herself does. He’s going to be so unbearably smug about it for the rest of eternity-- once he stops being worried, that is.

“You don’t smell right, Amaryllis,” he informs her testily one morning as if she’s doing it to slight him, tongue flicking at the air close to her, grazing her skin. Waking up in his arms with his tongue on her is usually a fantastic way to start the morning; leave it to Arum to find a way to make even that annoying.

“Good morning to you too,” she says, eyes narrowing even as the last of sleep grogginess slips away from her mind. The bed to her left is empty; Damien wakes with the sun to do his drills. Rilla gets up at a sane hour, and Arum likes to lounge in the warmth of the bed after they’re both gone until it dissipates.

“You must be ill,” he informs her. She pushes him away and gets out of bed.

“I think _I’d_ notice that, Arum,” she says, but then she goes down to her lab in the Keep to do some diagnostics on herself anyways. Just to be safe. On her way down the Keep sings her good morning, vines and leaves stretching forward to try and brush against her skin, flowers blooming in the wake of her footsteps like she’s a goddess of spring in one of Damien’s poems.

The Keep is nice, the best parent in law she could ever ask for, but not usually like _this._

She strokes a hand along one wall as she walks and it sings, joyous.

She gets to her lab and goes through some basic test. Checks the colors of the white of her eyes in a mirror, opens her mouth and peers down at her throat and at her tongue, pokes at her gums to see if they’re sensitive. Her hair has its usual luster, her skin is a healthy shade of brown, her nails are firm, her breath is fine. She does some stretches and it goes easily. Her head feels clear. She feels completely fine, except for perhaps her feet are slightly sore.

Sick; honestly, Arum doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He may be a brilliant creator, but _she’s_ the wise woman. Just because she smells a little strange… does she smell strange? Perhaps she just needs a shower. Yes, that’s probably it. Arum and his delicate sense of smell…

 

“Something is _wrong,”_ Arum insists when they all get into bed that night, tongue flicking near her jaw, throat, searching for the source of the ‘problem’.

“Wrong!?” Damien asks, voice immediately tense. “What sort of wrong?”

 _“Nothing’s_ wrong,” she says, peeved. “I did a checkup on myself this morning, Arum. I’m in the pink of health. _And_ I took a shower, so I don’t know what you’re complaining about.”

“You do not smell the way you usually do,” he says, dissatisfied. She closes her eyes and counts inwardly to five, reminds herself that he’s just worried for her. It’s sweet, really. Just completely unnecessary. Which makes it annoying.

“It’s probably nothing,” she tells him. He makes a face like he’s about to start an argument over it, and she distracts him by kissing his face, off center from his mouth, but Arum’s been kissed enough to know to be flustered by the meaning of it by now. Then she rolls over and kisses Damien, who melts into it and returns her affections. There’s the beginnings of a quiet rumbling clicking from the pit of Arum’s chest behind her; the vibrations feel nice, with his chest pressed up against her back.

“There’s nothing to worry about,” she says soothingly, strokes her foot up Arum’s calf as her hands trail down Damien’s sides. He’s an anxious mess of a man, but he’s incredibly in love with her. It makes for a wonderful distraction from his worries. And she does so love the love struck gooey look that crosses his face whenever she gets close enough and smiles.

She makes her men forget about their completely unwarranted worries for her for a few hours. And then they sleep, deeply.

 

The next day, she wakes up to the Keep piling succulent fruit in front of her. That’s not the norm, but she thanks it and eats. The Keep gives her sweetness, tartness, saltiness, and some fruit that’s even _spicy._ The combination of flavors is heavenly, and she eats more than usual.

“Why are you pampering her so?” Her lizard has apparently woken up.

The Keep sings, and Arum apparently flawlessly understands it as usual, even if his tail lashes in what she’s learned to recognize as confusion.

“What do you mean, you confounding thing? She may be a blossom but she isn’t a flower. She can’t _seed.”_

She raises her eyebrows at him. “Excuse me?”

“The Keep is confused,” He grumbles. “That must be it.”

And that’s that.

 

The next day, she vomits shortly after waking up. The keep strokes vines comfortingly over her back, and Damien is outside in the garden doing drills and Arum is still fast asleep. She doesn’t tell either of them. She feels fine after it’s over, and this would just fuel their irrational worries. It was just a brief thing, a little bug. Nothing to be worried about. It’s nothing.

 

It happens again the next morning.

 

And the next.

 

“Symptoms,” she says into her recorder. “Repeated nausea leading to vomiting shortly after waking. Soreness of feet. Hunger. Strange appetite. And the Keep _won’t let me drink.”_ She pauses briefly to glare pointedly up at the ceiling. It doesn’t bother to so much as sing her a short apology. Snatching drinks out of her hands… She doesn’t even drink much!

“Subject: Amaryllis of Exile. Myself. It may not be very objective, to try and find out what’s wrong with me using my own expertise but, well, I’m an expert. There’s no one more knowledgeable about human anatomy and the pitfalls it falls prey to in the vicinity than me. Some of the quacks in the Citadel still believe in _humors,_ and Arum, bless him, doesn’t even know what sneezing is. Besides, it’s probably nothing serious. I may not be normal, but I’m not in pain. This will be over in no time.”

 

It is not over in no time. In a whole week, she does every single test that she can perform on herself on her own that she can think off, theorizes, looks for causes, and almost every single morning that week she’s sick. The Keep continues to coddle her, humoring her strange appetites and reaching out with vines to help her descend staircases. Arum keeps sniffing at her suspiciously. Damien is getting increasingly worried.

“Were you… napping, my love?” he asks her one afternoon as she groggily blinks awake on something resembling a couch, if it was made out of living plant matter. It’s surprisingly soft. There’s an open book in her lap.

“Guess so,” she says, and yawns, stretches her back.

“That’s not like you,” he says, and he’s right, it isn’t. She’s always had a problem with getting enough sleep. She knows how important to your health a proper sleep schedule is (just look at what happened to the Keep!), but she’s always struggled with tearing herself away from her work. Having two lovers has definitely helped make her bed a more appealing location, but she’s never _napped_ before. “Are you sure that you’re well? Oh, what if Arum is right and there _is_ something wrong with you? What if it’s deadly? What if--”

“Damien,” she says, exasperated. “I took a nap. I’m not dying, dear.”

“Are you certain?” he asks her, anxiously earnest. “Are you _absolutely sure?”_

“Yes, Damien, I’m sure.”

“Are you cold? Are you too warm? Have you lost any weight recently?”

“I feel perfectly fine,” she soothes him. Honestly, if anything she’s put on some weight recently. All of that snacking… “Come here.”

He comes, slotting himself into her waiting open arms. Damien gives perfect hugs. Just the right amount of squeeze, warm solid muscle pressed up against her. She strokes a hand down his back, feels the firmness of him, smells his scent-- like grass and fresh salty sweat, not unpleasant at all. A warm thrill stirs in the pit of her gut.

“Come closer,” she purrs.

“But I’m already-- oh. _Oh.”_ And he goes confident and assured the way he gets in battle sometime. One of her hands settle over one of his pulse points, feels his heart race for entirely different reasons than his usual. He kisses her lips, her hair, her neck, reverent. She sighs, happy.

Less than ten minutes after waking up from a nap, and she’s already lured her fiance into canoodling with her. She makes a note to add ‘increased libido’ to her list of symptoms.

 

Her list of symptoms isn’t ringing any bells for her, but the human memory can be faulty, even for someone like her. She searches through her recorder and notes and journals, looking for any symptoms similar to hers. Her ailment still doesn’t feel dangerous, but she’s getting sick of all of the vomiting and soreness and fatigue.

Unfortunately, the closest she comes to a match is pregnancy, but that can’t be the case. She’s been regularly drinking a mixture of her own design that completely prevents it. She has two years of secret but highly enjoyable pre marital sex with Damien to prove its effectiveness. There’s no reason for it to fail now. There are no new factors in her life that would--

“Amaryllis,” Arum says. “The Keep says that you should go to bed.”

“The Keep doesn’t decide my bedtime,” she replies waspishly, bent over her notes. She looks out of a nearby window. Oh. It’s completely dark. She’d gotten too absorbed in her work.

“You’re not well,” he says, twice as waspish, approaching her, scenting the air.

“I’m not bad, either,” she says. She’s stopped trying to argue that she’s perfectly healthy. Clearly, _something_ is going on. If only she could figure out what…

He comes close enough to thread a hand through her thick hair, placing one on her shoulder, another on her waist, close enough to share body heat (and smell her better, no doubt). Possessive and casually intimate, trying to hide his concern because concern is beneath him, of course. She leans back into his broad chest, a comfortable and familiar support.

“You will sleep,” he says. “A good night’s rest is important for the immune system.”

“Don’t use my own words against me. And the only reason I’m up is that I’m trying to find out what’s wrong with me.”

He looks down at her notes, leaning past her. Blinks, goes tense.

“What is that,” he says, and she follows his wide, slitted eyes.

“It’s an illustration of a pregnancy,” she says. “Although the stomach doesn’t actually turn transparent, that’s just some artistic license for the sake of better conveying--”

“Your young grow inside of you,” he says.

“Yes,” she says, slowly. “We’re mammals.”

“They don’t hatch from eggs.”

“No.”

“Or sprout from seeds.”

 _“No,_ Arum.”

“I knew that,” he says.

“Uh huh.”

“The symptoms sound familiar,” he says, eyes flitting quickly over the page. “Could this be it?”

“Impossible.” She shakes her head. “I’ve been drinking something to prevent it for years now.”

“And you’re sure it works?”

“Of course it does. I’d have at least three children by now if it didn’t.”

“And science works the same way every single time,” he says.

“That is the appeal of it.” She turns around in his arms, puts a hand to his jaw. “Arum, is something wrong?”

She’s gotten sick of that question directed at her by now, but there’s something in his eyes…

“What if,” he says carefully, that rattle heavy around his words, “something magical made it inconsistent?”

“Something magical? Like what?”

“Like a monster,” he says.

 

Oh.

 

Oh, _damn._

 

Rilla, feeling incredibly stupid, does some new tests. She watches the results, and feels even more stupid, and cradles her belly.

She had made a mixture to prevent pregnancy between humans. She had never thought to test and see if it would hold up to a _monstrous_ pregnancy.

 

When she breaks the news, Damien _faints._ Luckily, Arum is there with his four arms to catch him. He looks at her gravely.

“Will we need to kill it?” he asks. Rilla decides that she’s relieved that Damien isn’t awake for this.

“I don’t know yet,” she says. “I’ve never heard of something like this happening before.”

“Because a monster has never taken a human lover before?” he muses.

“Or perhaps because anyone who’s gone through this before has been wise enough to keep it a secret,” she says.

“Or,” he says, and Arum can be practical sometimes, so very practical, “no one has ever survived it.”

“That’s… a possibility,” she says. Interspecies breeding rarely goes well, after all, either for the mother or the child. Unless the species are similar enough… Rilla and Arum look as different as night and day. Scales and skin, towering muscle and soft curves, tail and hair, fangs and flat herbivore teeth, claws and blunt nails. But in the grand scheme of things, they are not so different, really. Two legs, some amount of arms, two eyes, nostrils, a mouth, bipedal and sentient and emotional and intelligent and curious and in love. Not all of that is very scientific reasoning, but magic is real too, even if she doesn’t entirely understand it. Arum understands it. Arum lives and breathes it. Their child will be a child of science and magic… Saints, she’s already attached.

She can be practical too. “If we have to get rid of it, then we’ll get rid of it. But… I want to try, Arum. To see if it’ll take. The two of us together, we can keep a close enough watch to be safe, won’t we?”

“You will not die because of me,” he says.

“It wouldn’t be because of you if I died,” she says firmly, stern. “And I won’t die in the first place. I’ve got too much work to do here! Not to mention the two of you.” She draws closer to them.

Arum softens. A tall and indomitable monster, his shoulders curve inwards like he wants to surround her with himself.

“A child,” he muses. “I’d never considered it, before. I’m a solitary creature, and once I passed, the Council would merely announce a new caretaker for the Keep. And I did not think that this was possible.” He huffs. “Foolish of me, to underestimate magic.”

“It’s not magic,” she says, teasing, a familiar, comfortable argument. “It’s biology. Science.”

“The creation of a new life made of nothing but love, and you call it not magic? Perhaps you are the foolish one, blossom.”

“Nothing but love? You should see how much I eat--”

“... Rilla?” Damien says, and they both look down at him, pale and waking up in Arum’s arms. “I had the strangest dream.”

“I’m pregnant,” she says. “Almost certainly with Arum’s child.”

His eyes bulge and he lurches up. “Oh!” he says. “Really!?”

“Really,” she says.

He looks down at her stomach like it’s something strange and very startling.

“We need to get married,” he breathes.

“Damien, I’m not sure that we could pass off the child as yours.”

“But birthing out of wedlock--! The Saints, Rilla!”

“You do realize that the child will have to be kept a secret, right?”

Damien, who wears his heart on his sleeve and recites poems about her loveliness in the barracks according to Sir Angelo, looks heartbroken.

“Except for with a chosen few trusted ones,” she hurries to say. “Like Sir Angelo, and Talfryn and--”

“Names!” he exclaims, and suddenly that’s all they can talk about for the rest of the week.

 

They decide to be open with her pregnancy. If it comes out with scales, then it will have been a tragic stillbirth. If it comes out, to all appearances, a completely normal human then that means that of _course_ it is Damien’s, who else would it be? Sir Angelo, Marc, and Talfryn are all sworn to secrecy and then invited to a baby shower that quickly goes off the rails a bit, but it’s fine.

She and Damien have an outdoors wedding, outside the boundaries of the Citadel, but not in the swamp with its dangers. Her dress is loose and covers the slight swell of her stomach. The golden ring sparkles on her finger, and she thinks about getting a chain for it so there’s no cross contamination when she works. Damien’s vows make her cry in front of everyone, to her embarrassment. They come home and start the _true_ celebration with their third, give him their own vows, just for the three of them. They don’t need their union sanctioned by anyone; Rilla would be with them both no matter how many laws it broke, and it already breaks quite a few.

The Keep coddles her. Damien frets, and fusses, and often cries tears of happiness and waxes poetic over the life growing in her stomach. Arum casts spells to try and divine the future, to wish her luck, to grant her good health. Rilla keeps careful track of her wellbeing.

They decide to name it once the child is born. It will be more magical that way, Arum claims. More meaningful. Damien thinks that sounds romantic. Rilla jumps at the chance to stop the endless arguments.

 

She often wakes up to Arum’s hand on her belly, claws carefully turned away.

“This will be an adventure,” she says. “It will go fine. The child will be wonderful. There’s no one I would rather do this with than you two. You’ll do a great job.”

“I never imagined this,” he says, soft, so soft around his sharpness.

“I love you.” She kisses him, listens to Damien snore softly to her side. “And we will only introduce more love to our home.”

 

She comes out with strange eyes that Rilla feels like she could explain away as a condition, with scales that can be covered up by clothes, and already with small sharp teeth poking out of her gums. She bets she could hide that as well. She kisses her and she stops crying straight away, like magic.

“My little Snapdragon,” she says, straight from the heart, and Damien collapses against her, exhausted from her cries of pain and his own worry and now relief, and Arum puts a hand on each of them, crowds them close.

“That is a good name,” he says, and scents her. “She smells hale.”

Rilla sighs. “I promise I won’t underestimate that tongue of yours again.”

Arum hums, smug just like she knew he’d be. She closes her eyes and leans into his embrace, Snapdragon swaddled against her chest, Damien close.

It all went perfectly, against all logic and reason. Like the luckiest of experiments, like a miracle from the Saints. Like magic. Rilla thinks that she might love magic just a bit. 


End file.
